Cable’s Impact on Texas and the U.S.

Just as impressive as cable’s entertainment, education and technology offerings are the industry’s contributions to the Texas and U.S. economy.

A new report shows that in 2016, Texas’ primary operators – Altice USA/Suddenlink, Charter/Spectrum, Comcast/Xfinity and Vyve – generated 151,527 direct and indirect jobs, employed 16,614 and had a total economic impact of $22.5 billion.

In addition, the report recognized cable’s advancements and investments in technology.

The updated report from Bortz Media & Sports Group, Inc., shows that cable’s impact on the economy and on how we get our information and entertainment has grown and transformed significantly in recent years.

In Texas alone, 2016 impact totals show that cable operators have added almost 40,000 direct and indirect jobs and increased its total economic impact by $6.6 billion just since 2010.

This year’s report found, “Through its aggressive re-investment of capital and its efforts to deploy new and innovative services to consumers, the cable operator industry has fostered the development of a highly competitive telecommunications market and has been a catalyst for broadband growth in the U.S. Through these investment and innovation initiatives, the industry has exerted a substantial impact on the United States economy.”

Key national economic findings for 2016:

Total industry impact: $421 billion.

Total jobs: 2.9 million – since more than 1 million jobs were added in the past decade.

More than 1 million jobs added by the cable industry in the last decade.

At least 300 cable employees work in each of the country’s 435 congressional districts.

Sales and use taxes associated with cable subscriptions: Over $4.2 billion – revenues to state and local government entities.

In addition, the report recognized cable’s advancements and investments in technology.

DVR

The number of cable customers with DVRS has more than doubled since 2007, totaling more than 22 million cable customers or 44 percent of cable homes in 2016

TV Everywhere

TV Everywhere allows cable subscribers to access TV programming at home or on-the-go across multiple platforms such as computers, tablets and smartphones. In 2016, an estimated 5.4 billion programming views took place on these alternative devices – up from 2.1 billion in 2014.

Broadband

The report found, “the cable industry’s commitment has led to U.S. broadband service that is among the fastest, most affordable and most widely available in the world.” More than 93 percent of U.S. homes have access to cable’s internet service, and residents in every state enjoy average peak connection speeds over 50Mbps.

“By taking the lead in making broadband widely available … the cable industry has maintained its leadership in the delivery of high-speed internet service and increased its customer base by a factor of five over the past 14 years,” the report states.

Digital Phone

The number of digital phone customers served by the cable industry has grown from just over 2.5 million at the end of 2002 to almost 32 million at year-end 2016.